JUST OUTSIDE OUR WINDOWS by Elizabeth J. Haist

Just outside our windows
Stands a new day
 This raw cacao of life has always been waiting for our alchemy
For me, I am between a cornfield and a sky /watching the dinosaur-like lurch of turkeys traversing the spent corn / bent over but still giving
My new glass jar feeder has the red squirrel in a whirl /as my Marigold , the puma aka house cat emits her Morse code chatter at the chick a dees /.I love my little congregation of birds, juncos hanging on, the boy named sue birds
( the titmice , of course) the competing borg of sparrows and the delicate frayed pinkish cardinal  with her primary mate sitting
square in the seed pile as she tilts her head at me,reticent and cautious /the sweet peeps of arrival begin like clockwork and with laser precision the nuthatch swoops in from the lone oak, a vestige of a long ago farmer …(MY doppelganger oak I declare, where I imagine Oprah’s SuperSoul Conversations are held) / though I rent this space, this sliding door to an expanse of sky , my
eastern door to the world
These moments I cradle , I savor it like the sound of sweet temple bells, reminding me to breathe and leave joy in place
Today, I don’t mind being the stop gap between stimulus and response
that magical interlude between breaths
Between strangers
This between /that zippers in and out